#durgakainthola

[art-now-india]

Spirit of China, durga Kainthola

An Artist's statement on portraits Portraits of artists and creative persons from diverse fields have never failed to fascinate me as an artist. For me, they define a kind of a visual diary that is not confined within limits of time, space or color but is a continuous process that grows along with my personal growth as an artist. I try to bring across a fusion of contemporary images and mythology. Marilyn Monroe for example, is a classic example of visual beauty and personal tragedy. I have presented her through the lens of Warhol, directly challenging the viewer with her dreamy, half-closed, heavy-lidded eyes. The Mexican artist Freda Kahlo comes across as a picture of liquid grace in her flowing evening gown. Calligraphy is an integral part of my portraits. I blend digital print and mixed media to explore the borders of both traditional and modern technology. I was inspired to paint "Autobiography of the artist Amrita Shergil" in triptych form. The painting portrays a relaxed Amrita in the central panel. A letter to her parents penned in 1934 occupies the panel on the left. The letter spells out the artist's wish to return to India to pursue her creative and artistic evolution. A famous fresco of the Ajanta caves that was the crux of Amrita's inspiration defines the right panel. The top left of the central panel shows the image of a mother and child that Amrita herself did titled "Bharat Mata." Portraits tell stories. They capture and freeze moments in the past to form part of the present and show the way to the future. Inspired by the works of not just the great artists of the world but by popular culture as well. I documents History and Contemporary subjects with equal ease.

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Spirit-of-China/156938/194518/view

#durgakainthola #popart

[sabahasan]

At the group show with Sarla, Bharti and Durga #indianartists #womenartists#sabahasan#sarlachandra#durgakainthola https://www.instagram.com/p/Bzp2DEuFs5tUJ1_0Dc83V4504GzMpkD0DtJUEk0/?igshid=s4gcngkvddo4

#indianartists #womenartists #sabahasan #sarlachandra #durgakainthola

[puneartfestival-blog1]

Meet and experience the dazzling paintings done by one of the renowned Artists - Durga Kainthola at Pune Art Festival 2019. . Pune Art Festival - https://www.puneartfestival.org/ Dont miss the chance to visit her stall. . Save the Dates for your visit - 26 - 29 Dec 2019.

#puneartfestival DurgaKainthola rangasamartha artist indianart paintingexhibition painting pune artgallery puneart india

[art-now-india]

Chastity -V, durga Kainthola

“Documenting history” creative journey, reflexion of the process of change. For some time now, I have been exploring myriad levels of visual imagery, juxtaposing iconographic detail drawn from the ancient and modern art both Indian and from the west…. moved into the fluid realm of active, syncopated three-dimensional visualization sequencing idiosyncratic language and perception. This journey into multi-media, moving imagery carries the broader dimensions of energy infused with contemporary metaphor. Mirrored in the highly polychrome written and painted signboards are modern enactments of miniatures, illuminated per neon lit sign, the quotidian transforms into the surreal… A spontaneous and dramatic re-interpretation….

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Sculpture-Chastity-V/156938/194524/view

#popart #durgakainthola

[art-now-india]

Warhol and the History of Art, durga Kainthola

PALETTE OF MY VISUAL THEATRE In Palette of my Visual Theatre, Durga Kainthola stages a stimulating, complex play between art, the symbolic and the immeasurable. The distinctiveness of these works lies in cohesion of images, simplicity of line and rendering of the pictorial. Throughout, concrete expression of her style flows as “extensions of my thoughts, day to day happening of things in life.” Portraiture dominates her oeuvre, in a signature expression of beings, of other artists. Confident and receptive, she relinquishes control and allows drama to unfold. How many minute attributes are transfixed, caught by the painter’s brush, the poet’s verse. An original and chimerical foresight, which celebrates work with a cosmopolitan flair and international cross-fertilizations. Kainthola’s palette boasts a vast vocabulary and rainbow realm of hue. At once lyrical, and poetic, wise and irreverent, witty and timeless, it illumines a global amphitheatre of her inquisitiveness. Metamorphosis connotes the infinite possibilities of transformation, concretisation of an ineffable truth – of change, within continuity Glimpsed in a library in 1982, an image of the Marilyn Monroe diptych by Warhol surfaces in her work in 2002…as magic of renewal, the crystal lacuna of past, present and future. Magnifying a spectral lexicon, to signify art as synergy, Palette of my Visual Theatre, stretches the imagination. Multifold personae from Indian mythology surrounded by flora and fauna encounter Warhol in Goddess Comes to New York, mounted within a light box. Throughout the History of Art series, a reverberation of the ‘combines’ of Robert Rauschenberg’s work can be seen, part-painting, part-drawing. An astute, surprising effort at blending vibrant allegories. Poised against black-and-white backdrops, Kainthola effects resonance between the energies of Picasso, Gaugin, Modigliani, Duchamp, Tyeb Mehta and Souza, often with magenta lotus borders and prominent AEIOU friezes of Hindi letters. In The Painter’s Studio, Kainthola’s own face serves as the canvas upon which Vermeer paints on his easel. Pages from My Visual Notebook (3 books) chronicle a movement from the abstract to concrete. Intricate tableaus unfold as if a narrative hand scroll, with a new language from when she first incorporated her own image and drew upon it with myriad tonalities of ink. A contemporary draughts woman’s autobiographical take on the quixotic portrait of the Mona Lisa. Day after day, she produced a visual entity (computer generated inkjet prints on paper and vinyl) and worked on its surface…these became her ‘diary’. On one single page, two twentieth century masters of different genres, V.S. Naipaul and Bhupen Khakar, materialise, as if to orchestrate a ‘ thinking out of the box’ dialogue of simile and narrative realism. A most adroit example of this fluidity is the triptych, Amrita SherGil, from the Notebook series. One panel portrays SherGil’s letter to her parents, the second art from Ajanta, and the third SherGil herself seated. Kainthola’s work honours the interconnectivity of art, stated in SherGil’s letter: “Modern art has led me to the comprehension + appreciation of Indian painting + sculpture.” A strong, original painter who in her own life and creativity bridged modernism between the East and West. Influences of Surrealism’s serious experimental attitude toward the subconscious characterise work such as The Kiss. One butterfly impasto emblazons Monroe’s lips like a mercurial censor and another in her hair like an Art Nouveau barrette. Throughout the Palette of my Visual Theatre, this embrace of the concrete and the fantastic share centre arena, to realise a tenuous unity of scale, subject and composition. Perhaps, Kainthola’s work, throughout its diverse phases and painterly endeavours, juggling contextual synapses and lenses, can be seen as ‘gestalt’ (Ger. configuration). On another dais, consider the elegance and fancifulness of the panoramic piece, The Three Graces. Small-scale drawings are intense and subtle in character, a precursor to the latest ambitious solo paintings, The Last Judgment, Modigliani and Nefertiti. Kainthola’s imagination is incessantly changing scenes, dangling scenarios across the picture plane. At any time, retracing and commingling spheres of memory and inspiration: observed prints in the sand on Bombay beaches appear as the footprints of Raza and Hussain on earlier canvases (again this trace quintessence of art), lines from T.S. Eliot’s poems, an ongoing aesthetic homage to fiercely gifted woman painters, in particular Frida Kahlo and Amrita SherGil (esteemed for their inventive worlds), as well as pop icons, classical deities, old masters and modern iconoclasts. Kainthola blends diverse figure-ground liaison and rich pigmentation from the vista of art history, from classical Western (think of Correggio and Da Vinci) and Indian court painting (Mughal and Rajput miniatures), to the most established and controversial of modernist procreation/invention. Transcribed with a novel spontaneity, her brush and pen act like a glass lantern, casting shadows, uncovering mental pictures. Furthermore, The Last Judgment (print on canvas with acrylic/mixed media) reconfigures classical references, juggling the meaning of portrayal. Dialectics of creativity mark a swirling, omnipresent meeting of the physical and metaphysical. “The creation of an icon is an art of the same order of the creation of the world.” From one composition to another, the Palette of my Visual Theatre, summons a continuum of abstract and representational, seemingly the blend of matter and reflection. And so does her wand paint its energetic wit and passion beyond our minds, casting an intuitive metamorphosis and vital fusion of colour and form. A moment not out of time, but in time, in what we call history: transecting, bisecting the world of time, a moment in time but not like a moment of time. -T.S. Eliot, chorus from The Rock, VII (1934) Elizabeth Rogers Artist Statement: For some time now, I have been exploring myriad levels of visual imagery, juxtaposing iconographic detail drawn from the ancient and modern art both Indian and from the west…. moved into the fluid realm of active, syncopated three-dimensional visualisation sequencing idiosyncratic language and perception. This journey into multi-media, moving imagery carries the broader dimensions of energy infused with contemporary metaphor. Mirrored in the highly polychrome written and painted signboards are modern enactments of miniatures, illuminated per neon lit sign, the quotidian transforms into the surreal… A spontaneous and dramatic re-interpretation of an artist ….

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Warhol-and-the-History-of-Art/156938/156288/view

#durgakainthola #popart

[art-now-india]

Warhol and the History of Art, durga Kainthola

Warhol and the History of Art. Warhol and the History of Art, Durra kainthola’s recent works on paper conjoin past and present, East and West, in a fusion of contemporary imagery and ancient mythology. Marilyn Monroe addresses the viewer through Warhol’s lenses. As Monroe’s face was splashed in fuchsia tints across Warhol’s silkscreen art for ‘eternity’ related across this iconic subtext, famed paintings from art history come refreshingly alive. Against such a panoramic black-and-white backdrop, vibrantly colored metaphors re-narrate the visions of Byzantine, the old masters, the impressionist, the cubist, the surrealist, classical Indian paintings, and mughal miniatures. Drawings from the caves of Lascaux to Dali’s persistence of memory, from the chairs and still lives of Van Gogh to the long-necked women of Modigliani. These digitally generated prints of Warhol’s face are dramatically transformed by the artist’s deployment of myriad hues and tonalities. As she paints over the image, beside it and around it…defying the boundaries. On the pictorial plane, Kainthola depicts lyrical metaphors, interwoven and uncovered by the mind’s eye. Seduced, the viewer enters a world of traditional and modern vocabularies. By juxtaposing global visual images, the text of art history is no longer limited nor trivialized. The viewer is asked to perceive multi-fold meanings as the eye moves from one work to the next. Unwittingly and with an unexpected twist of irony these works also question: Who is the icon? The image; its maker; or both or neither. Timeless, beyond continental boundaries, affirmative of fusion. A global lexicon of metaphor and aesthetics, celebrates the vitality and essence of art and its never-ending rebirth. Elizabeth Rogers

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Warhol-and-the-History-of-Art/156938/3150910/view

#popart #durgakainthola

[art-now-india]

Chastity-II, durga Kainthola

Tales of Modern India-II Pop Art: Reflection of the process of change. As an artist, I evolved from painting popular images, contemporary miniatures to Sculpting exquisite bikinis and devising equally intricate chastity belts. My creative and artistic impressions of the popular art all along, is social statement too. Artists live in a pluralistic world, reflecting and expressing this pluralism in their art. An artist like any other sensitive human being can be as disturbed by the suffering, natural calamities, death in humanity as he/she can draw inspiration from feminine beauty which is an integral part of pluralism. It takes more courage to use the bikini and chastity belts as an exclusive subject of artistic expression as a social commentary. Female beauty today has metamorphosed into a marketable commodity widely advertised across the globe under the thinly veiled guise of contests sponsored by multinational corporations and women’s magazines. Beauty is a blend of intellect and figure of expression and articulation. To look beautiful and seductive is a woman’s right and if she has a sensuous body, she has the right to choose to display it. In India, the “Great Indian White Bra” stands as a symbol of femininity, seduction, beauty and sensuality. 80’s can be attributed to strict censorship rules which did not allow nudity in Indian cinema. For the actress, the model, the beauty queen and the film-star, it could never turn into a trap because she holds the remote control in her hand and can switch it off any time she decides that she has made her point. With time the meaning and usage changed and the chastity belt was forgotten, but recurring front page news of the rape and molestation of women reminded me of the usefulness of the protective shields, a variant which was worn by men during wars and sportsmen. The chastity belt is an urban legend, commonly found in medieval poetry, satirical literature and caricature, with most examples belonging to the renaissance period or later. I have designed Chastity belts to be displayed, unlike the original which would obviously be hidden away from public gaze. They are well crafted, being embellished with peacock motif and floral knobs and rivets in contrasting metallic hues. Perhaps these flowers, keys and locks are a take-off on the fig leaf of ancient times. Durga Kainthola, 2012

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Sculpture-Chastity-II/156938/192354/view

#popart #durgakainthola

[art-now-india]

Tribute to Helen, durga Kainthola

“Documenting history” creative journey, reflexion of the process of change. For some time now, I have been exploring myriad levels of visual imagery, juxtaposing iconographic detail drawn from the ancient and modern art both Indian and from the west…. moved into the fluid realm of active, syncopated three-dimensional visualization sequencing idiosyncratic language and perception. This journey into multi-media, moving imagery carries the broader dimensions of energy infused with contemporary metaphor. Mirrored in the highly polychrome written and painted signboards are modern enactments of miniatures, illuminated per neon lit sign, the quotidian transforms into the surreal… A spontaneous and dramatic re-interpretation….

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Sculpture-Tribute-to-Helen/156938/194532/view

#durgakainthola #popart

[art-now-india]

Warhol and the History of Art, durga Kainthola

Warhol and the History of Art. Warhol and the History of Art, Durra kainthola’s recent works on paper conjoin past and present, East and West, in a fusion of contemporary imagery and ancient mythology. Marilyn Monroe addresses the viewer through Warhol’s lenses. As Monroe’s face was splashed in fuchsia tints across Warhol’s silkscreen art for ‘eternity’ related across this iconic subtext, famed paintings from art history come refreshingly alive. Against such a panoramic black-and-white backdrop, vibrantly colored metaphors re-narrate the visions of Byzantine, the old masters, the impressionist, the cubist, the surrealist, classical Indian paintings, and mughal miniatures. Drawings from the caves of Lascaux to Dali’s persistence of memory, from the chairs and still lives of Van Gogh to the long-necked women of Modigliani. These digitally generated prints of Warhol’s face are dramatically transformed by the artist’s deployment of myriad hues and tonalities. As she paints over the image, beside it and around it…defying the boundaries. On the pictorial plane, Kainthola depicts lyrical metaphors, interwoven and uncovered by the mind’s eye. Seduced, the viewer enters a world of traditional and modern vocabularies. By juxtaposing global visual images, the text of art history is no longer limited nor trivialized. The viewer is asked to perceive multi-fold meanings as the eye moves from one work to the next. Unwittingly and with an unexpected twist of irony these works also question: Who is the icon? The image; its maker; or both or neither. Timeless, beyond continental boundaries, affirmative of fusion. A global lexicon of metaphor and aesthetics, celebrates the vitality and essence of art and its never-ending rebirth. Elizabeth Rogers

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Warhol-and-the-History-of-Art/156938/3152071/view

#durgakainthola #popart

[art-now-india]

Kareena, durga Kainthola

“Documenting history” creative journey, reflexion of the process of change. For some time now, I have been exploring myriad levels of visual imagery, juxtaposing iconographic detail drawn from the ancient and modern art both Indian and from the west…. moved into the fluid realm of active, syncopated three-dimensional visualization sequencing idiosyncratic language and perception. This journey into multi-media, moving imagery carries the broader dimensions of energy infused with contemporary metaphor. Mirrored in the highly polychrome written and painted signboards are modern enactments of miniatures, illuminated per neon lit sign, the quotidian transforms into the surreal… A spontaneous and dramatic re-interpretation….

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Sculpture-Kareena/156938/194529/view

#popart #durgakainthola

[art-now-india]

Lady Gaga, durga Kainthola

“Documenting history” creative journey, reflexion of the process of change. For some time now, I have been exploring myriad levels of visual imagery, juxtaposing iconographic detail drawn from the ancient and modern art both Indian and from the west…. moved into the fluid realm of active, syncopated three-dimensional visualization sequencing idiosyncratic language and perception. This journey into multi-media, moving imagery carries the broader dimensions of energy infused with contemporary metaphor. Mirrored in the highly polychrome written and painted signboards are modern enactments of miniatures, illuminated per neon lit sign, the quotidian transforms into the surreal… A spontaneous and dramatic re-interpretation….

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Sculpture-Lady-Gaga/156938/194526/view

#durgakainthola #popart

[art-now-india]

Warhol and the History of Art, durga Kainthola

Warhol and the History of Art. Warhol and the History of Art, Durra kainthola’s recent works on paper conjoin past and present, East and West, in a fusion of contemporary imagery and ancient mythology. Marilyn Monroe addresses the viewer through Warhol’s lenses. As Monroe’s face was splashed in fuchsia tints across Warhol’s silkscreen art for ‘eternity’ related across this iconic subtext, famed paintings from art history come refreshingly alive. Against such a panoramic black-and-white backdrop, vibrantly colored metaphors re-narrate the visions of Byzantine, the old masters, the impressionist, the cubist, the surrealist, classical Indian paintings, and mughal miniatures. Drawings from the caves of Lascaux to Dali’s persistence of memory, from the chairs and still lives of Van Gogh to the long-necked women of Modigliani. These digitally generated prints of Warhol’s face are dramatically transformed by the artist’s deployment of myriad hues and tonalities. As she paints over the image, beside it and around it…defying the boundaries. On the pictorial plane, Kainthola depicts lyrical metaphors, interwoven and uncovered by the mind’s eye. Seduced, the viewer enters a world of traditional and modern vocabularies. By juxtaposing global visual images, the text of art history is no longer limited nor trivialized. The viewer is asked to perceive multi-fold meanings as the eye moves from one work to the next. Unwittingly and with an unexpected twist of irony these works also question: Who is the icon? The image; its maker; or both or neither. Timeless, beyond continental boundaries, affirmative of fusion. A global lexicon of metaphor and aesthetics, celebrates the vitality and essence of art and its never-ending rebirth. Elizabeth Rogers

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Warhol-and-the-History-of-Art/156938/3152071/view

#popart #durgakainthola

[art-now-india]

Eve, durga Kainthola

“Documenting history” creative journey, reflexion of the process of change. For some time now, I have been exploring myriad levels of visual imagery, juxtaposing iconographic detail drawn from the ancient and modern art both Indian and from the west…. moved into the fluid realm of active, syncopated three-dimensional visualization sequencing idiosyncratic language and perception. This journey into multi-media, moving imagery carries the broader dimensions of energy infused with contemporary metaphor. Mirrored in the highly polychrome written and painted signboards are modern enactments of miniatures, illuminated per neon lit sign, the quotidian transforms into the surreal… A spontaneous and dramatic re-interpretation….

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Sculpture-Eve/156938/194531/view

#popart #durgakainthola

[art-now-india]

Kareena, durga Kainthola

“Documenting history” creative journey, reflexion of the process of change. For some time now, I have been exploring myriad levels of visual imagery, juxtaposing iconographic detail drawn from the ancient and modern art both Indian and from the west…. moved into the fluid realm of active, syncopated three-dimensional visualization sequencing idiosyncratic language and perception. This journey into multi-media, moving imagery carries the broader dimensions of energy infused with contemporary metaphor. Mirrored in the highly polychrome written and painted signboards are modern enactments of miniatures, illuminated per neon lit sign, the quotidian transforms into the surreal… A spontaneous and dramatic re-interpretation….

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Sculpture-Kareena/156938/194529/view

#durgakainthola #popart

[art-now-india]

Warhol and the History of Art, durga Kainthola

Warhol and the History of Art. Warhol and the History of Art, Durra kainthola’s recent works on paper conjoin past and present, East and West, in a fusion of contemporary imagery and ancient mythology. Marilyn Monroe addresses the viewer through Warhol’s lenses. As Monroe’s face was splashed in fuchsia tints across Warhol’s silkscreen art for ‘eternity’ related across this iconic subtext, famed paintings from art history come refreshingly alive. Against such a panoramic black-and-white backdrop, vibrantly colored metaphors re-narrate the visions of Byzantine, the old masters, the impressionist, the cubist, the surrealist, classical Indian paintings, and mughal miniatures. Drawings from the caves of Lascaux to Dali’s persistence of memory, from the chairs and still lives of Van Gogh to the long-necked women of Modigliani. These digitally generated prints of Warhol’s face are dramatically transformed by the artist’s deployment of myriad hues and tonalities. As she paints over the image, beside it and around it…defying the boundaries. On the pictorial plane, Kainthola depicts lyrical metaphors, interwoven and uncovered by the mind’s eye. Seduced, the viewer enters a world of traditional and modern vocabularies. By juxtaposing global visual images, the text of art history is no longer limited nor trivialized. The viewer is asked to perceive multi-fold meanings as the eye moves from one work to the next. Unwittingly and with an unexpected twist of irony these works also question: Who is the icon? The image; its maker; or both or neither. Timeless, beyond continental boundaries, affirmative of fusion. A global lexicon of metaphor and aesthetics, celebrates the vitality and essence of art and its never-ending rebirth. Elizabeth Rogers

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Warhol-and-the-History-of-Art/156938/3152093/view

#durgakainthola #popart

[art-now-india]

Warhol and the History of Art, durga Kainthola

The artist of today can no longer afford to be locked up in an ivory tower, technology forces information down our throats almost instantaneously around the world. Any artist who harbors lofty illusions of being individualistic or original in his work is simply deluding himself. In such a scenario it is indeed refreshing to come across the works of Durga Kainthola, who is unabashedly inspired by the works of not just the great artists of the world but by popular culture as well. She documents History and Contemporary subjects with equal flair as she candidly states, "I re-create all that has been created by God and left behind by History". Durga relates to images that impinge on her consciousness with an analytic eye and a wry sense of humour. Her Contemporary Miniature in gouache titled “Warhol and the History of Art” form part of an ongoing series, incorporating elements of theatre, Mughal miniatures, Chinese clouds and Persian style, elements of embroidery have also been incorporated in her paintings. It is not just the heroic, political or artistic figures that catch her fancy; the quirky juxtaposition of Princess Fiona and the little Ogres against the portrait of Warhol adds the requisite touch of sardonic humour.

https://www.saatchiart.com/art/Painting-Warhol-and-the-History-of-Art/156938/151352/view

#popart #fineart #durgakainthola